[Clarification: Although Greg Gachassin owned Amazing Storage in 2008 when the EPA violations occurred, he is no longer the owner of that company. In October of 2011 Amazing Storage was purchased by Chris and Diane Ortego. Amazing Storage has had no relationship or financial connection to Gachassin since that time.]
It turns out that it's not just state ethics charges Lafayette real estate developer Greg Gachassin has been dogged by lately.
Earlier this year, Gachassin settled with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, shelling out $60,000 to settle a Clean Water Act violation at his Fountain View residential subdivision, part of a 34-acre development off Kaliste Saloom Road originally permitted as New Center Park. It certainly could have been much worse for his pocketbook, as he was also cited for Clean Water Act violations at Wingate by Wyndham, the hotel he developed in front of the subdivision, and for the adjoining construction site called Amazing Storage. The violations date back to 2008.
 |
|
|
The EPA fined Lafayette developer Greg Gachassin $60,000 for not having a plan to manage rain water runoff during construction of Fountain View, a 17-acre residential development behind his Wingate by |
EPA records obtained by IND Monthly indicate that Gachassin’s company, The Lauren Group, did not have a Storm Water Pollution Prevention Plan while he was developing the subdivision (in simple terms, a plan for managing rain runoff during construction), didn’t implement a plan and failed to perform required site inspections. “We contacted you at the time of the inspection, but you declined to accompany the inspectors onsite,” writes John Blevins, director of the EPA’s Compliance Assurance and Enforcement Division, in a July 18, 2008, letter to Gachassin.
In July of last year, EPA Public Affairs Specialist Carmen Assunto told IND Monthly that the statutory maximum penalty was $16,000 per violation per day. At the time no fines had been paid, Assunto said, and the EPA was still in negotiations with Gachassin.
Assunto said EPA conducted an inspection of the construction project on May 20, 2008, and observed unauthorized (unpermitted) discharges of pollutants from the site to a coulee that emptied into an impaired waterway (a body of water that does not meet the water quality standards of the Clean Water Act and the state.) “During the construction, there were other violations documented by the city of Lafayette that were independent of EPA’s inspection,” she said.
One would think that this developer, who is making millions as a development consultant on taxpayer funded projects in the Lafayette area, would know better.
Gachassin did not immediately return a phone call left at his office this morning.
Assunto noted that the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality had conducted an inspection on July 29, 2010, and found the site to be in compliance.
 |
|
| Greg Gachassin |
MAY 17 Here's a column from James Gill, this time in the Advocate. Gill, who has jumped ship from the Picayune, writes about the absurdity of dueling polls in this post. The numbers are so wildly different, it is obvious that both sides are "cooking the books," he writes. In particular, he looks at Sen. Mary Landrieu, and how her recent actions in DC have been received by those polled. Gill's acerbic, amusing prose is a welcome addition to a paper so conservative as to be occasionally lacking in personality.
MAY 17 Blogger Tom Aswell continues delivering bombshells about the state education department and Gov. Jindal's education "reform" efforts. In this post, he reports that students in the Shreveport area have been signed up for a charter school without their knowledge or consent. Most interesting to Aswell is how this Texas-based charter (with ties to GOP types) got the personal student information it has, if the students didn't give it.
MAY 17 This post by JR Ball in the Baton Rouge Business Report is an interesting tongue-in-cheek look at recent Baton Rouge economic development efforts. Among the items he examines is the idea that gaining a Costco makes BR a "world-class city." (Really? All you need is a different brand of Sam's? MK!) This effort, and other recent ones, are all built on the taxpayer's back, with tax zones, tax incentives and tax rebates, Ball writes.
MAY 17 Blogger CB Forgotston is critical of the legislature's reliance on a revenue-estimating committee's decision to include projected tax amnesty income in this year's forecast. That's a problem, CB posts, because the deadline for these people to pay their taxes is June 30, 2014. So when do you think these people who haven't paid taxes in years are going to pay their taxes? Surely not before June 30, and that means the money won't be there for this year's budget, he argues.
MAY 17 Here's an interesting blog out of California by a Hollywood writer, attorney and academic named Brian Alan Lane. He blogs about higher ed, and was a whistle-blower in a scandal over false credentials. In this post, he takes aim at LSU's new top dog, King Alexander. It's convoluted and a little confusing, but it sure makes Alexander a lot more interesting than he was yesterday.
MAY 17 Blogger Robert Mann writes about the LSU Board's refusal to allow Dr. Fred Cerise to testify before the legislature about Gov. Jindal's plan to close down all the state's charity hospitals and dump the poor on the private system. It's hard to imagine anyone more qualified than Cerise to testify about that, so why would anyone try to prevent him doing so? Mann thinks it is because the powers that be aren't interested in hearing any truth about the plan.
MAY 17 This post on the Louisiana Sinkhole Bugle, a blog that notes developments in the Bayou Corne and Jefferson Island salt domes, talks about a proposed expansion of the salt dome storage under Lake Peigneur in Iberia Parish. Residents are working against it for several reasons, including two biggies: the sinkhole disaster in Bayou Corne and the continuing, unexplained bubbling on the surface of the Lake.
MAY 17 NOLA police arrested more people Thursday accused of either being involved in the Mother's Day shooting or hiding the suspect afterward, this Gambit story reports. The NOLA police chief said he suspects the whole thing was gang-related and throws out a challenge to the gangs: he's got informants now, he says, and he knows a lot more than the gangs want him to know. The people who live in the neighborhoods terrorized by gangs are ready to talk, he says.
Most Read
in case you missed it
Subscribe to this comment's feed
It's time we put this "developer" (i use that sarcastically, how do you call a guy who builds housing projects a developer
?) out of business and stop letting him use our funds as his piggy bank!